The Sunday herald and weekly national intelligencer., 1887-02-27
THE CASUAL cYNrc
Essays to be Critic and Reviews an Advc'
tlsemcut,

Essays to be Critic and Reviews an Advcr-
tisemcnt.
The style of advertisement which sometimes
meets the eye In the theatre programme is OF n
racy flavor that Ia almost startling. There is so
much money and thought expended In advcrtis-
ing, sometimes with such original results, that
there is q good deal of interest about advertise
mcnts after ALL AS reading matter they are
open TO the same objection as dictionary, In
being rather disconnected. but they are not /
tedious; if you don't like the style of author
the next paragraph may please You better The /
majority of people are so trained to habits of .
reading that they will read anything rather than 4
nothing. The portcrs In railway station fur |
nish mental provcndcr for the waiting traveller u
he can get no better What man, left tothc choice
of nn old newspaper or his thoughts while wnit-
ing at the dentists, will not choose the paper
We must read if there s print within reach OF us,
and so we read the advertisements, which are not
such bad literature either.
am FREQ to confess, though l don't like the
folio style of theatre programme at all, have
furtivc liking for the advertisements. l don't
want them like, Mnlvolio's greatness "thrustupon
me-" like the programme to serve Its purpose
canddly and conveniently. but with that done l
don't care how many "ais they append to II; the
moro the mcrricr.
| Having thus established my capacity for the
position of literary critic of the advertisements by
frankly confcssing that read thcm-mny all
who criticise my work dO ms farlyl-l will re-
sumo what began to say. There isa class OF I'D
vertisemcntsI sometimes see In the programme
and from the fact that don't see It in other
papers, Judge that they consider II particularly
| appropriate to the thcatrc-going public. am
| inclined to resent their assumption. We have
done away with the idea that there Is a sin In
going to the theatre; we claim that Its associn-
tions arc not degrading but clcvating; that Its
patrons are largely made up OF religious people,
certainly of cmincntly moral and respectable peo-
pie. Then why does patcnt.mcdicinc man call
us all Boys" not In the youthful but the fast
sense of the word, and tell us to drink his stuf
because ait takes away the rocky feeling In the
morningy" His familiarity Is In bad taste; his
insinuation that we arc going to feel "rocky"is
vulgar. lie offers further inducements to us to
take his medicine by saying IL we do we won't
need q shoc-horn to put on our hats In the morn-
ing" For our information II is added that "al
bars have it."
To the great majority of the audience that pc
cular quality of tonic which enables one to dis
pense with shoc-horn In adjusting hat would
be of little use, and 1t is safe to assume that the
fact of its being so much recommended for the
Inconvenience which attend drunkenness will
not recommend 1t very highly to sober people.
A more astute advertising manager, 1t seems to
me, would try to make for his medicine more
general reputation. The persons who need re-
storativc after Il spree are likely to find it-at
bars The people who might be persuaded to
take II for some of the ordinary ills of the flesh
may be discouraged by this special application of
Its efficacy, md they really the larger part of
. humanity, in theatres or out. The man who goes
out for cloves makes more noise than the man
who sits STILL but there are only few of him af-
ter all.
Gives Mr.. Howells n Gentle Prod.
Mr.. Howclls writes very pleasingly in the Feb
ruary Harper about the short-stcry literature of
our country, but he provokes II reply when he
speaks of one of Miss Jewetts stories "whcre the
material of Il much longer tale is wildly flung
away" There is the highest authority for be-
fieving that "therc Is thut Nnvcth more than Is
meet aud It tendcth to poverty" and Mr.. Howclls
story of April Hopes" In the same Harper opens
asif II were instance of that disastrous econ.
omy. II is better to spend the material for long
story In good short one than to make the material
!, for short story into II poor long one. Mr.. How.
cllss verness never deserts him. but his material
must be getting short, for there is none whatever
apparent in his new story ms yet. He is simply
talking of nothing ut all, and doing II well. A
good method is nm admirable thing In story.
teller but It does not enable him to dispense witt
the story. An ugrceablestylc ndds great charm
to literature. but It does not atone for lack OF
ideas. Readers will be apt to prefer the prodi.
J gality which Mr.. Howells dcplorcs in another
rather than the pnrsimony he has fallen into
t himself.
The National Drill Pictures.
The Autographs which ornament the window.
with n view of the coming National Drill arc nj
+ object of considerable attention. II was no
' known when the drill was proposed that 1t twoult
d be necessary to make such extensive changes II
8 the topography of the city in order to render Il
/ effective. In fact there has been nothing said IL
: all the preparatory talk about removing all the
@ buildings between the Capitol and Monument
but they nre all gone in the picture. Nor ha
there been anything heard about divcrting tn,
n Potomac into a new channel in front of thu
Il White House, nor about setting the Capitol side
n wise, as 1t appears in the picture. The Monu
l. ment hns considerable alterations about its bnse
n lakes are converted into terra trina for the con
d veniencc of the marching soldiers, but We ar
II glad to notice that II is not to he cut or. II Il
n represented at full height, though there is no
s quite for II in the picture and the apex I'M
J. to project into the margin. Perhaps the move
Il appearance of the city ms represented in thes
d pictures may be explained by the fact that the
d were made by some one mt distance, whose ide
II of Washington was not very definite. Or per
n hnps the artist belongs to the Impressions
h school, and merely threw in n few features Of tn
4, city, as he would throw II little pink grass or
few Nie-grcen cabbages in landscape, t.
hcightcn the impression of the drill
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